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Shock as Gov officer gets 250 stands

MIRROR REPORTER

GREAT ZIMBABWE HOTEL – The six-member Commission of Inquiry into the sale of State land in and around urban areas since 2005 expressed shock that a Government housing officer Kudakwashe Zvinavashe got 250 residential stands at Victoria Ranch under a State-run land development scheme.

Zvinavashe, a housing officer in the Ministry of Local Government Public Works and National Housing used his company called Stellenbosch to get the residential stands.

The commissioners said the conflict of interest involved in the deal was obvious and shocking.

Zvinavashe sat as a Government representative in the consortium committees that were responsible for the allocation of stands at Victoria Ranch. His designation was; a housing officer responsible for development in Victoria Ranch. The Consortium is a grouping of all land developers who got lad at the Ranch.

Zvinavashe told the Commission that he didn’t see any conflict of interest in the deal. He however, failed to produce most of the documents required of him by the Commission. He could not produce his application and offer letters for the stands.

The Commission ordered him to go and find the documents and bring them. Zvinavashe said he had since sold most of the stands at prices of $4 000 upwards.

Zvinavashe was allocated the land in 2012 and left Government in 2017.

“Do you not see that as a Government official you were not supposed to be involved in all this? Did you not have an unfair advantage that you were the one responsible for the allocation of stands and you were at the same time busy getting the stands for your company?” asked Dr Heather Chingono.

Justice Uchena said he would have understood it had Zvinavashe got one stand for himself. He later said that he admitted wrong doing.